


Every Blue Christmas

by Skyler10



Series: Verse as in Music [1]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Christmas, F/M, Male-Female Friendship, Songfic, very mild angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-22
Updated: 2014-12-22
Packaged: 2018-03-02 18:36:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2822138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skyler10/pseuds/Skyler10
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stuck at a posh holiday party in Pete's World, heiress Rose is missing her Doctor and sick of sad Christmas music because it hits a little too close to home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Every Blue Christmas

On her second Christmas in “Pete’s World,” Rose swirled the champagne in her glass and sighed as she watched the swaying couples on the dance floor. The peppy holiday tunes had slowed into Kelly Clarkson’s “Every Christmas” and Rose was already sick of this song. Not the music itself, but the too-close-to-home lyrics.

 

_Every Christmas_

_It's always the same_

_I'm still here waiting_

_Praying for you to finally come my way_

_It's been so long_

_Since I've seen your face_

_If Santa cared for me at all then you wouldn't be_

_So, so far away_

 

Another Christmas season, another holiday party for the elite of London society, of which she found herself a part. A few members of Torchwood were acting as undercover security, but she was officially off-duty and attending as a guest. Never would she have dreamed of one day being required by her parents to attend what she dubbed “princess rubbish.” It wasn’t so much the black tie gala or the fancy food or the fame of being an heiress. She could easily shrug off all of those shallow changes if it weren’t for what had happened between living in a tiny estate flat with her mum and landing here in a parallel world with a rich father, paparazzi and a family mansion. She even enjoyed a few of the perks, like her midnight blue Audi TT and rarely needing the psychic paper due to her family name.

But she’d scrap all of it – the money, the fame, even the car – if it meant getting back to the Doctor. As long as he was in their home universe, she would never feel whole here. This could never be home. Her true home was the TARDIS, even though it had been two years since she’d been inside.

 

_Every Christmas_

_Counting the days_

_Maybe this year will be different_

_And I won't be, be alone again_

And as the expensive dresses and jewelry and lights and festive decorations all sparkled around her, Rose couldn’t help but let a little annoyance creep into her thoughts. The stars were going out and she had been shooting herself across dimensions to find the Doctor for what seemed like much longer than it really was. She had one more major mission planned before the holidays. This time she was sure she had the right world, but then again, she had thought the same thing over and over. In some the Doctor had never existed. In others, he had failed to stop the Time War and Earth was one of few planets remaining. In one she almost ran into her parallel self leaving after he regenerated into a man she had never seen before. Previously long-gone nightmares of watching him burn golden with regeneration energy haunted her once more after that particular dimension jump.

So far she had avoided the one scene that she feared the most: arriving just in time to see him die (really die). She could handle anything but seeing him dead with no hope of regeneration.

 

_Under the mistletoe_

_Let it snow_

_Come on home_

_Every Christmas I'll wait_

 

“What’s with you?” Mickey asked, lightly bumping her shoulder. “Look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“Don’t,” she warned him.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean…”

“It’s alright.”

“Just wanted to see if you fancy a dance.”

Rose frowned but took his outstretched hand as he led her to the dance floor. The two had become more like brother and sister, the way they had been as kids, now that they were both stuck here. She knew Mickey missed home too, though his version of home involved his old buddies and a council flat instead of the TARDIS and traveling through time and space. He wasn’t overly fond of flying through the vortex, as much as he thrived on the adrenaline of Torchwood.

She rested her head on his shoulder as they swayed.

Michael Buble’s rendition of “Blue Christmas” played next. Which, of course, reminded Rose of the time the Doctor had taken her to see Elvis in concert and accidentally landed them at one of his Christmas concerts so they didn’t get to hear half of the non-holiday-related classics they were hoping for.

 

_I’ll have a Blue Christmas without you_

_I'll be so blue just thinking about you_

_Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree_

_Won't be the same dear, if you're not here with me_

 

Halfway through the dance Rose gave up trying not to think about missing her Doctor.

She stepped back and held up her hands in surrender.

“Thanks, but it’s no use,” she said in apology and ran out to the balcony.

He gave her a minute as he decided what to do. He’d gotten over any lingering bitterness or jealousy in the time since Bad Wolf Bay, having watched her hit rock bottom and pick herself back up again. He was over her in the romantic way, but still loved her as his best friend and sister.

“Just needed some fresh air?” he asked as he stepped close. She raised an eyebrow in warning not to start an argument here, but he wasn’t planning on it. “Me too. Was getting a bit stuffy with all those posh people in one room.”

Rose smiled, though it didn’t quite reach her eyes. He put his arm around her shoulder and noted she much be freezing in her sleeveless gown.

“Here.” He placed his jacket around her shoulders.

“Thank you, Mickey.”

“Anytime.”

“No, I mean…” She turned to look him fully in the eye. “Thank you for everything. For being so sweet, for your help with the cannon, for not hating me, for putting up with…” She blew out a breath just thinking of all she had put him though. It swirled in the December air and vanished. “Just, thank you.”

“I’d do it all again, Rose. Every bit. If it meant you get what makes you happy.”

“But you know what that is…” Her eyes searched his for some explanation of why he would do all this for her.

“Yeah.” He let out a short laugh. “I know. But this project is worth it if it means we find out what’s stealing the stars.”

“Even if it means I may never come back?”

“You’re better than you think. You’ll make it. I know you will.”

“No, I mean if I do make it.”

“Then we’ll all be safe again.” He stared up at the ever-darkening sky. “We’ll be safe again once we’ve got the Doctor and Rose Tyler in the TARDIS, the way it should be.”

She placed a hand on his cheek and he returned her intense gaze.

“Thank you.”

“You’ve said that already,” he quipped.

“Shut up.” She smiled and took his hand, just clasped, not fingers entwined. “Come on, it’s the most wonderful time of the year.”

“What?”

“The song!” Rose laughed. “Let’s get back to the dancing and forget all this…” She gestured toward the balcony, indicating her worries and sorrows which brought them out here in the first place.

Mickey allowed himself to be led back to the dance floor, where lesser informed members of what Rose privately thought of as the Glitter Brigade whispered behind manicured hands about just _what_ scandalous thing the Vitex heiress was up to with that boy.

“No, no, no,” a daughter of a fashion mogul corrected them. “It was in all the magazines last month, remember? She’s got a lost love from back at university. It’s a beautifully tragic story...”

“Hmph. I’ll believe it when I see him,” another countered. “That boy right there looks hopelessly smitten with her.”

“Not at all,” a third chimed in. “I heard he’s playing for the other team, if you know what I mean, with that blond boy over there.”

A champagne glass lifted in Jake’s direction where he was stuffing himself full of hors d’oeuvres.

“Oh my!” The ladies cackled and shifted their gossip to less mysterious celebrities than Rose Tyler and her not-so-undercover Torchwood men.

By the next Christmas party, Rose would put any doubt of her heart’s interest to rest. By then, she will have been seen nearly everywhere she goes with a tall, skinny, attractive but odd gentleman in a blue suit. The gossip tabloids will rate them in a year-end poll as the celebrity couple with the best and brightest smiles. And the Christmas after that, they would report that the heiress’s left ring finger reflected a definitive shimmer in the twinkle lights as the man with wild brown hair swept her across the gala’s dance floor.

**Author's Note:**

> This series is also posted at Teaspoon, but they are less song!fic friendly so the Ao3 versions will be a little longer because they will include all the lyrics in the places I originally intended. :)


End file.
